By now, Better Than Ezra holds few surprises. They make BTE songs full of longing, ache and surging energy. They’re attentive enough students of modern pop that their recordings don’t sound dated even if they’re not 100 percent au courant. There’s a light sheen of Coldplayesque gloss on much Paper Empire, but it suits the band and Kevin Griffin’s sense of drama. They make being young, alive and in love sound like an epic experience. There are times when Paper Empire sounds very familiar, though. Not just moods and tempos but chord changes and melodies, as if Song A from King of New Orleans was genetically spliced with Song B from Closer. That still produces melodic, attractive pop so it’s not the worst possible outcome, but it means songs don’t necessarily stick in the memory despite big, immediate hooks. The one song that stops me every time is “The Loveless,” a grand production with a choir and strings behind the question, “Who’s going to love the loveless?”

If the differences between this album and those before it are largely cosmetic, the gestures outside of Ezraville are the most awkward tracks on the album. “All In” comes at a point when the poker wave has crested on television, leaving the game’s signature phrase behind as a marker of a past moment, much like “Talk to the hand” and “Don’t go there.” And the odd voices Griffin adopts in the hard rock “Hell No!” are similarly puzzling. He dabbles with Auto-Tune on the verse to no clear purpose, then in spoken word section, perhaps he’s going for a Patton-like pep talk, but he sounds hickish, making his rallying speech seem slightly mocking. But those songs won’t define Paper Empire. It’s all about beautiful songs with just enough muscle courtesy of Tom Drummond’s exactly-in-the-right-place bass and Travis McNabb’s barely controlled drive. They still make versions of the songs you’ve known for all these years, and they still do it well.